Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has discussed Dr. Helmut Marko’s recent brutal analysis of Sergio Perez, after the advisor admitted that Checo had “woken up” from his “dream” of becoming World Champion.
Marko’s harsh words come after Perez finished on the podium at the Belgian Grand Prix, marking his first back-to-back podiums since Miami.
The 33-year-old endured a bit of a downward spiral after Miami until the recent Hungarian Grand Prix, with the pressure of being in the title fight having seemingly gotten the better of him.
With Max Verstappen having cleared off into the distance, Perez has rediscovered his early season form, and is looking much stronger again.
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Marko has noticed this and is hopeful that being out of the title fight will help the Mexican “focus again”.
“He has now woken up from his World Championship dream,” Marko said at the Belgian GP. “Maybe that will help him to focus again on delivering the best possible performance.”
Horner addressed Marko’s comments given how blunt they were, with the team boss admitting that everyone knows the 80-year-old can be “fairly straightforward” when he talks sometimes.
Even the Red Bull team principal admitted though, that Checo is probably aware that the title is “out of reach” once again, making his season about “maximising his own performance”.
“I think we will know that Helmut is fairly straightforward in some of his analysis,” Horner told the media including PlanetF1.com.
“But I think that Checo knows that barring a disaster for Max that this championship is out of reach, so it’s about him maximising his own performance, not losing ground to any of the rivals behind, and then try to pick up a few wins between now and the end of the year.”
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Perez was much stronger at Spa-Francorchamps than he has been the last couple of months, with his P2 having been very comfortable.
Horner hopes the Red Bull driver will have taken ‘confidence” from this and can now move forwards.
“I think he’ll have taken a lot more confidence out of the weekend,” said Horner. “He put it on the front row, he led the grand prix, he’s finished second.”